Alpha Dog (2006)

Nic Cassavetes follows in his father's footsteps in as much as attempting to make unconventional movies, but like his dad he is simply turning out product that mainstream audiences and box office returns have little use for. Mr Cassavetes tells us he regards the 'Notebook' as his worst movie (perhaps it was just a vehicle for his talented actress mom Gina; 'Lonely are the Brave' 62). While I was not overly impressed with the Notebook, it somehow looks reasonably successful compared to this appalling effort. The only redeeming aspect of Alpha Dog is the idea of it being loosely based on a factual case. If a movie maker is going for shock value he needs to consider the audiences he is out to shock (more like alienate) it could be those he needs to have on his side. Any left watching might be the very ones this miserable show is supposedly criticising. Unnecessarily and relentlessly foul mouthed to the point of making Mr Cassavetes look like he's exposing us to his own morally corrupt side - this wretched work simply becomes grossly uninteresting and a bulk audience put-off. It's not often so many IMDb user reviewers all have the same warnings and complaints but, they are remarkably revealing in their unanimity.Any good performances along the way are eventually reduced to overacted screaming matches - cancelling out much interest in any of the characters. It also features too many story elements that trail off into territory more along the lines of the writers own suppositions. Much of the titling captions that keep popping on screen are a feeble attempt to add a 'documentary' feel and come off looking amateurish. If we were talking about ugly movies that deserve to be banned this would be high on the list. Grow up Nic and re-evaluate your life's calling before you fully destroy the family name.Closing thought: Looking back, John Cassavetes, like Orson Welles, was also a better actor than movie maker. Maybe they should have concentrated on what they did best.

Alpha Dog (2006): Dir: Nick Cassevettes / Cast: Emile Hirsch, Shawn Hatosy, Justin Timberlake, Ben Foster, Anton Yelchin: Very depressing story of a drug deal gone wrong and the consequences upon the innocent. A kidnap victim sees his circumstance as a vacation due to the nature of his captures. Although well paced the solution may not be the most satisfactory. Director Nick Cassevettes shoots this like a live documentary, which may be the point since this is based on true events. Cassevettes previously made The Notebook as well as a despicable piece of junk called She's So Lovely. Emile Hirsch plays the drug leader responsible for the kidnapping due to a confrontation with someone else. His actions will have him on the run with possible death penalty consequences. Shawn Hatosy plays a gay player too willing to do Hirsch's bidding, and to aid a debt he agrees to perform a murder. Ben Foster plays victim's hot headed brother who threatens to kill the drug leader but all ends on a loss. Justin Timberlake is the surprise casting as one of the kidnappers whom forms a bond with the victim yet consequently must perform an unwilling task. Anton Yelchin plays the victim drawn in through deceit and sex that ultimately leads to depressing events. Very well made film but portraying kidnapping as fun and games may strike a bad cord that turns ugly fast. Score: 7 / 10

I honestly didn't think any of this would ever work again after I had seen scattershot 2003 Canadian film "11:14", a film about young adults and their cars; partners; sex and shenanigans which was decent-'n'-everything, but in the wake of Pulp Fiction (and, to a lesser extent, Doug Liman's "Go") couldn't help but induce a reaction from any sane film-watcher that was along the lines of: Enough is enough. For the uninformed, the approach is to boil a series of strands and stories about a number of lowlifes down into a singular set urban zone and have them fall over one another during the ensuing hijinks, etc. that kick off as a result of a backfiring routine singular occurrence. The good news about Alpha Dog is that it works an absolute treat, a deeply distressing yet inherently moving film about people who amble into certain circles; quickly find their feet and then come into access the sorts of cars, houses and wealth that ought to be beyond them at this early stage in their lives.Where the likes of "11:14" was something like eight vignettes crammed into an 88 minute run time, and my criticisms were that if Pulp Fiction was by its own admission "three stories...about one story", and was an involving; burning drama which struck us as adult, why would you want to up the story quota and shorten the runtime in order to create something inferior and merely childish? To this extent, Alpha Dog's approach of covering two or so strands about several thugs falling out over loans, drugs and kidnaps told over two hours-plus is a welcome relief of taut drama and engaging genre frameworks. Crucially, 11:14 crammed its narrative(s) into its runtime – Alpha Dog more-so manoeuvres its narrative(s) into its runtime.The film unfolds in 1999 (almost a wry 'nod' to "Go", released in '99) and we're on the outskirts of Los Angeles, more specifically an affluent part of the state of California wherein the first generation of boys and girls in their early twenties have grown up as the kids of the gangsters and drug dealers who've come to possess these abodes in these neighbourhoods and are now old enough to have influence over these surroundings. Two of these people are a marijuana dealer and a neo-Nazi skinhead and the crux of the film revolves around a debt and consequent falling out between these two people. The dealer is a certain Johnny Truelove (Hirsch), a man whose introduction is very masculine in that he occupies a garage; possesses a number of weight machines and generally hangs out with a large group of other men who enjoy their swearing, etc. One boy, a smaller and younger kid named Elvis (Hatosy), is in debt to Johnny but we sense he doesn't mind so much as he gets to hang out with these guys. We sense that Johnny could most likely break Elvis in half at any moment should he so wish.Hence, the film's central burning conflict is thus allowed to carry with it a more agonised; more excruciating and more explosive dynamic when Johnny is placed up against the aforementioned Nazi figure, a man of Johnny's age and aggressive stature named Jake (Foster) who doesn't take any stick from anybody but who gets mixed up in proceedings on account of the fact he himself owes Johnny money. Persistent failure to pay up results in Zach (Yelchin), Jake's fifteen year old brother from one of his step-parents' other marriages, being taken from the side of a road one evening and held under ransom until the debt is paid. Jake makes for an interesting entity, someone who seems to enjoy getting Zach into trouble at home but is remorselessly violent in his attempts to find his brother when he goes missing and answers do not arise; he seems restrained and almost vulnerable, but at once evil and even psychopathic. The actor, Ben Foster, does a remarkable job in darting back and forth and really being able to depict all of sadism and desperation tinged with a hint of sadness.I don't think, like British film Kidulthood from the same year in its dealing with youths out of control across numerous strands, there will be those who will embrace the film as much as I did. It will not be for all, whereas the idea that it strikes us a somewhat watered down version of Larry Clark's "Bully" from several years earlier, I think misses the point. While equally strong-a piece, I took to Alpha Dog more out of its attention to narrative and its indelible attitude to depict the victim at the centre of its story, a teenager who suddenly finds himself in a web of sex; nauseating affluence and thuggish machismo whose own tale of being a prisoner sees this young creature teeter on swaying either into the drug-swamped mire or carrying on as he was before. He is at once his own character entity while systematically acting as a supporting act to what is essentially a gang war that kicks off because of him on the outside. In tune to "Bully", this is a humid-locale set tale of young adults living off a diet of drugs and hedonism as their parents watch on from the touchlines, suspicious but not strong enough to act. In spite of the tightly woven story and good eye for dramatic crime scenarios, it wouldn't be so tragic if practically every frame of it wasn't what really happened to several juveniles some years ago.

Realizing that this is a true crime movie, the screenwriters took a lot of license in what they created. My disappointment with this movie isn't in the story that was told, but the evolution of the characters from beginning to end. We start out watching Johnny Truelove, this supposed bad boy drug dealer/gangster, of whom everyone is fearful. He dictates orders to Elvis Schmidt, who is indebted to Truelove to the point of humiliation and slavish obedience. Truelove's conflict with a hothead named Jake Mazursky is shown early in the movie, with the rest of the movie revealing how the kidnapping of Mazursky's younger brother by Truelove's crew will be resolved. At this point, other reviewers can recount the rest of the story, as I would rather describe the high and low points that followed. First, Truelove's transition from intimidating and street smart gang leader to incompetent bungler was not credible to me. While his character looked to manipulate his cohorts into deciding, and hopefully taking the fall for, what to do with a kidnapped 15 year old boy, he simply wasn't believable in turning into a shell of his former self. Lead actor Emile Hirsch lacks the depth to pull this off. Second, we are never told why, other than money, Schmidt is so deeply indebted to Truelove. One would think that the degradation suffered by Schmidt would be enough to motivate him to seek a way out from under Truelove's thumb, rather than matter-of-factly being willing to commit murder for Truelove. The wannabe gangster angle was by itself not enough to explain that.Third, why would the kidnapped younger brother Zack Mazurksy be so cooperative when he had to know he was being driven into the middle of nowhere to be killed? He had previously demonstrated his worthy martial arts skills, so was therefore capable of defending himself and escaping his captors. For this I blame the screenwriters. Why add this element to Zack's character if it were not to be used later in the film? I found it to be an unnecessary distraction.The high points include two impressive performances. The first was from Justin Timberlake, whom I had not previously seen on screen as an actor. Being talented in pop music is what put him on the map, yet I found his portrayal of Frankie Ballenbacher to be natural and believable. The strongest performance I saw, however, was from Ben Foster, who played the unbalanced Jake Mazursky. Foster did not hold back, and succeeded in making this audience member uncomfortable with the tension and vigor he brought to his performance. Overall, this movie had a lot of potential, especially with Eva Cassidy's very moving rendition of "Over The Rainbow" playing in the background of the opening credits. Coupled with home movie clips of innocent children playing (namely Zack), it was foretelling of something tragic that was destined to occur. Unfortunately, the script fell apart the longer the movie went on.